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Installing Heated Grips and a Thumb WarmerOctober 7/04 Written by Greg We ride all year, in pretty much any weather. When it's raining, snowing, windy, below freezing, or night time, your hands and especially your throttle thumb can get pretty cold. When your gloves are soaked, and your right thumb feels like it's about to fall off, riding just becomes unpleasant, and you start thinking about other things you'd rather be doing. I picked up a set of Symtec Style II heated grips and a Symtec thumb warmer from Penticton Honda. The instructions as supplied by Symtec are straightforward, and I read them completely before beginning the process, to avoid any "surprises". Arctic Cat used a rivet and a small amount of glue to hold the stock grips on. Once I drilled out the rivet (located on the bottom side of handlebar at the base of the grip), it was easy to "crack" the glue, and the grips easily twisted off. I used a clean rag and cleaned the old glue from the handlebars; the instructions said to not use paper towels as they might contain silicone. I also wiped the throttle lever down. I mixed the two-part adhesive together, and applied it to the inside of the first grip and to the handlebar. The grip slid easily over the handlebar, and as I slid it on, I twisted it to ensure an even coating of adhesive. When the grip was completely on, I positioned it so that the power wire faced towards the front of the quad, then wiped off the excess adhesive. I did the same for the second grip. Give the adhesive time to set; don't twist or otherwise disturb the grips for 24 hours. I ran the power wires down the handlebars, tying them into place with plastic zap straps, and pushed them down through the fairing next to the steering shaft, then cycled the steering to make sure the wires didn't bind or tighten. The instructions said to take the power from a switched ignition source, which would prevent accidentally leaving them on. I didn't want to draw power through the stock wiring, so I wired a Bosch 30A relay to the ignition power wire at the fusebox. When the ignition was turned on, the relay would be engaged. When the ignition was off, the relay was disengaged. I ran a pair of 14-gauge wires from the battery to the the relay (+ and ground), and I ran 14-gauge wires from the relay to the switch. I actually replaced the stock switch with a 15A DPDT toggle switch, with a black rubber weatherproof boot. I installed a 10A ATO fuse between the battery and the relay, close to the battery. I wired the grips to the switch and the power cables per the supplied instructions. I covered the cables with plastic convoluted tubing to protect them. All crimp connectors were crimped, soldered, and covered with heat-shrink tubing. The grips came with some nice dual-spade connectors that allowed me to tap into the stock wiring without having to peel back insulation or use a Scotchlock. Now that all the hard work was done, the thumb warmer was easy to install. I used the supplied adhesive to mount the thumb warmer to the back of the throttle lever, and used zap straps to hold it in place while the adhesive set. Once the adhesive was set (I allowed 24 hours), I removed the zap straps and slid a piece of heat-shrink tubing over the lever and thumb warmer. I wired the thumb warmer to the switch in parallel with the grips. Note: Some grip and/or thumb warmer kits come with an external resistor for low power; if both of your kits have this resistor, you cannot wire both of them to the same SPDT switch because wiring them in parallel will change the total resistance and therefore the low-temperature setting. However, you can replace the supplied switch with a DPDT switch so you don't have to have two physical switches to mount and operate. Most people drill a hole in their instrument cluster to mount the switch. I actually wanted to wire up a switchable reverse light and handlebar-mounted third headlight, so I built an aluminum panel that accepted three switches and had cutouts to allow me to use two stainless-steel hoseclamps to fasten the panel to my front rack. Well, after using this setup, I can say that this is one of the best mods you can do to your quad. When the sun sets and it starts getting cold, or if it's pouring rain, or if it's the middle of winter and the wind chill is freezing the rain on your face (and we've been known to ride in all of the above at the same time!), having heated grips and a thumbwarmer can mean the difference between heading for home or continuing on. These grips will actually dry your wet gloves if no additional water is introduced. Total installation time was approximately 3 hours. Symtec p/n 210015 - "Style II" heated grips for 7/8" handlebars Symtec p/n 210010 - thumb warmer for Arctic Cat and Suzuki ATVs |
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